1. Field of the Invention:
The invention concerns a jib-arm handling apparatus designed to be mounted on a truck or on a trailer. The apparatus is provided to handle a container, a truck, a fork-lift truck handling pallet, or more generally, any voluminous load.
2. Summary of the Invention:
The jib-arm apparati of this type comprise generally a jib that can be folded back, operated by one or many lifting jacks and comprises a hook which is hung at the front of the container. These known jib-arm apparati generally present disadvantages of necessitating, in the lifting jack or jacks, a considerable disengaging force, in other words when the container is horizontally disposed on the truck, these previous designs require the load to initially be lifted before it can be swung toward the back in order to empty its contents.
To mitigate this disadvantage, the invention proposes a handling apparatus comprising a rigid jib (or a cross-beam) comprising two arms wherein one of the arms terminates by the handle and hook and the other arm is articulated on the front of a rigid arm, having a back extremity wherein the rigid arm is articulated in turn by its back extremity, on the front of a crank arm, the crank arm having a back section which is ultimately articulated on the back of the chassis of the truck. To provide the force to move the arms, three hydraulic jacks (or three groups of jacks) are provided, namely: (a) a first jack (or two parallel jacks) connecting the extremity in front of the rigid arm at the jib at an angle; (b) a second jack (or two second jacks in parallel) connecting the central part of the disengaged frame at the bearing/carrying chassis of the truck; (c) a third jack (or two third jacks in parallel) connecting the front extremity of the rigid arm at a disengaged frame. The invention connects the second jack and the third jack in parallel on a feeding source under pressure: when one sends the pressure simultaneously in the second and third jacks, it is the second jack that functions in priority because of a very important coupling. By inter-position of a hydraulic throttling solely on the arm of the circuit feeding the second jack, pressure variations are absorbed.
The invention comprises in other respects at the front of the crank arm, a means permitting the bolting of the rigid arm in detachable fashion with the crank arm when it is in the prolongation of the latter. The crank arm, the rigid arm and the inferior arm of the jib can be placed and maintained at an angle as a unite constituting a false chassis obviously level which can be lifted by pivoting around the back axis of the chassis, notably when one wants to lift and incline the container in the fashion of a dump truck.
The invention further comprises at the front of the crank arm some means permitting the bolting of the last arm in a detachable fashion with the chassis when the jib is folded on the back at an angle, when one wants to set the container at ground level or pick it up again from the ground.
The invention lastly permits lifting the swinging false chassis until the crank arm, the rigid arm and the inferior arm of the jib, are in a position to permit vertical placement on the ground of a silo or a similar load that has been transported on the vehicle in the horizontal position. The apparatus according to the invention is schematically represented on the appended drawings, by way of non-limitive examples.